Introit

Getting Back to Work

Schools are amazing places, in many ways. That includes "amazing" in the sense of, "can you still believe we think this way?!"

I am reading Creative People Must Be Stopped: 6 Ways We Kill Innovation, and the following paragraph resonated with me:

"In many organizations [schools], even ones with avowed objectives of supporting innovation, being "professional" means only doing work while seated at your neatly arranged desk. Being outside the office [school], even if you are working hard on a project, may not be considered a legitimate use of time. Informing a supervisor or colleague that you are going to a library to look for relevant information or to a busy café so you can do your best creative thinking generated the immediate query, "OK, but when are you getting back to work?" (32)

In some schools, this attitude toward work is changing, but I wonder what percentage of schools would prefer to subscribe to the equation that SxD=W (Sitting x Desk = Work)?

Proceed

What to do when you come to a moment of doubt regarding a particular course of action? We all come to those moments more often than we'd like to, and they can be very disconcerting.

In schools, we're great at deferring, delaying, relaying, pushing it back to committee, etc.

Rarely do we simply proceed.

Does that say something about innate fears that we have? Or that we trust the herd more than ourselves?

Just asking.

Still Not Getting the Message

A Chronicle of Higher Education piece about a new report from Public Agenda, a policy research group in New York says that the title, "Still on the Sidelines: What Role Will Trustees Play in Higher Education Reform?", pretty much tells the story.

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Rebuilding Confidence

Glenn Rifkin, for his article "Where have the leaders gone?" (Briefings on Talent & Leadership, Q1.2012), interviewed Warren Bennis, an organizational scholar and leadership author who has been writing on those topics for some five decades.

Bennis talks about "leadership flu," proffering that few leaders have "the touch" at this moment because "we are living in a time where things are changing more often and faster than ever before" (30).

To be sure, we have heard this message about frequent and fast change before; it permeates the media. However, Bennis gets down to brass tacks with Rifkin fairly quickly. Rebuilding confidence, for Bennis, starts "with some basic requirements, including a turn toward some clear thinking, pragmatism and truth-telling." Bennis opines, "The reality is that we are in a decline, and our leaders don't know how to manage during decline. We're not used to this. But we have to face a grim reality, and every leader has to find a way to express it in a way that people can understand" (31, emphasis mine).

Largely, schools have done tremendous work when it comes to managing this decline, I would argue. It is also accurate, I think, to say that "we're not used to this." We've never seen anything quite like it, that's for sure. It's sustained, and it won't be going away any time soon. Some schools have been forced into a corner in/from which they have to say, "OK, this is reality and we have to be incredibly pragmatic about telling our story and about getting out of it." Of course, there are those schools that continue to ignore reality and paint a different picture of their circumstances, hoping that by building that vision, it will come alive, somehow.

For many school leaders, rebuilding confidence is the challenge of a lifetime, especially when all the variables associated with that lifetime continue to change ceaselessly. That aside, however, I think that Bennis is right to assert that we ought to focus on clear thinking, pragmatism, and telling the truth. There is no utility in masking obvious issues, when it comes to school life and culture. Simple is best.

Strategy v. Work Flow

The sad thing I see in many strategic plans is that they're too long and verbose -- why is that? It's because they've incorporated much of what ought to be "normal work flow" into the so-called "strategic plan." To be sure, perhaps some items seem to be stretch-work, but does that notion elevate them to the level of strategy? In a word, no.

Allow me a small rant, also: nomenclature (what we call/name things) is really, really important. Again: nomenclature is important! I am dismayed when a plan identifies, say, five to seven "goals," each with three to five "strategies" to attain the goal. No! That's lazy "strategy templating." The school has one strategy, and it had better be well-articulated. A strategy is reliant on the confluence of action items, but there are not several strategies. Nomenclature is important!

Let me cite some examples that I've found in recently-published plans (released Fall 2011), as a means of illustrating what I'm saying. I have changed some wording to protect the innocent, but I've changed none of the fundamentals.

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Example 1

Goal: Highlight and create distinctive features of the curriculum that produce students who will thrive as learners in a landscape that is constantly changing.

Strategy #1 (to attain aforementioned goal): Engage the question of what it means to be global.

Strategy #2: Determine our ability to engage in collaborative learning.

Strategy #3: Develop goals for integration of educational technology.

Commentary (mine)

• The goal? Edu-speak and fluff. I know that's harsh, but re-read it. I dare you. What does it say, fundamentally? Sure, it sounds nice, but it has no meat on the bones. "Highlight and create" = normal work flow.
• Strategy #1? How did that end up being designated as a strategy? That's normal work flow, folks. It involves faculty meetings, as a start.
• Strategy #2? Normal work flow! The admin team needs to figure out whether the faculty is capable of moving toward a more collaborative methodology.
• Strategy #3? Normal work flow...do you see the pattern? The admin team should be working to identify these goals, as part of their normal work flow. Why elevate it to "strategy" when it is not?

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Example 2

Goal: To continue to seek balance in the school's finances and financial projections, all of which are supported by an outstanding educational program, qualified personnel, regular balanced budgets, and attention to the physical plant.

Strategy #1: Continue to use a financial model to forecast revenue and expenses so that school leadership can plan accordingly.

Strategy #2: Increase major gift fundraising to levels that will allow the school to increase the endowment by 40 to 60%, to meet deferred maintenance demands, to provide early retirement packages, and to provide more professional development funds.

Commentary (mine)

• The goal? Word to the wise: anything that starts with "continue to..." is NOT a goal, nor is it strategic, by any stretch of the imagination. That's normal work flow, everyone... Again, ask yourself what the "goal" says, fundamentally. It screams, "We will continue to espouse balanced budgets that ensure that all our needs are met." That's called How to Run a Business, 101. In all honesty, this "goal" should never appear in a "strategic" plan. Why? It's a restatement of the obvious.
• Strategy #1: See above, insofar as the use of the word "continue" is concerned. Is this really a strategy? Just like the "goal," it is a restatement of the obvious. It doesn't merit being in print. And, as if you couldn't guess, it's normal work flow.
• Strategy #2: Here's a perfect example of a statement that ignores the elephant in the room; in other words, it doesn't come out and say what it ought to say -- "Holy cow, we need to raise a bunch of money to take care of some needs that either a) have been ignored or b) have resulted from benign neglect on the part of the administration."

Strategy #2 above is the one area that could be truly strategic for the school -- take notice of how the school has tried to lump several important areas under the rubric of major gift fundraising. Is it really about major gifts, or is it about something different? This issue needs to be fleshed out in greater depth; what is more, it is potentially so strategic that it might make sense to avoid publishing it for the world to see. Think about it: would you really wish to share something that intimate with the wide public?

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I hope that these slightly-altered illustrations have underscored to you what ought to be normal work flow, and perhaps where an opportunity for true strategy lies, although it is currently masked within wording that obfuscates the real issue at hand. When such 'masking' happens, you can rest assured that the school will reach the end date of its plan (usually five years, with some variation) without having resolved some fundamental issues. And, I would submit, some pieces of the current plan will have to be re-articulated in the next strategic plan, since they weren't dealt with appropriately in the first place.

And so the cycle continues.

How to Be a Lucky Organization

The most recent issue of Briefings on Talent and Leadership contains a small feature called "How to be Lucky" (p. 25). The content, which I will outline below, reminds me of the question that schools pose so often, "How exactly might we be innovative?" There is much crossover between being lucky and innovative: the framework cited here would appear to support either one.

1. Keep an eye outside the usual channels. In other words, you won't get lucky in terms of finding/identifying something "new" if you don't allow yourself (as a school, in our case) to look for ancillary products (by-products, if you will) that result from something you do right now. If you only watch your 'usual channels,' i.e. what we do normally, you won't identify anything new.
2. Avoid the herd. If what you are trying to do as a school merely emulates what your competitors are doing--or what schools elsewhere are doing, you will have a challenging time being lucky. Why? Because you won't be unique; you won't be first in doing something. If you want to be first, you've got to avoid the herd!
3. Watch out for theory. "It is better to get someone's hands dirty actually doing something than to spend a lot of time exploring why it might be possible, or impossible. Laboratory scientists like to say there comes a time to 'stop reading and do an experiment.' (25; emphasis mine)
4. Do not underestimate the power of engineering to make the scrawny first version into a champion. In other words, it may appear that the first version/prototype of what you come up with seems less powerful than it should. Re-thinking how one tackles it, improves it, etc., may very well result in an outstanding product.
5. Watch out for the pitfalls of planning. "Serendipity can be expected and prepared for, but it can't be guaranteed" (25). Planning, especially over-planning (which we love dearly in schools), can result quite easily in choking off the innovation for which we are hoping! If you demand "predictable returns on investment," the result will be (most often) "small advances," and serendipity will be avoided.

In summation, schools need to be flexible. Being 'lucky' or 'innovative' is not the result of rigid planning or the eschewing of any ambiguity.

That's hard for schools to do, don't you think?

The All-Devouring System

Organizational systems, organizational cultures, and organizational behavior fascinate me. We often talk about "fit" in the independent school world, and "fit" can sometimes point to a particular culture, but rarely does it point to a system itself. I would argue that it's easier to pinpoint a cultural misalignment than a systems malfunction, though both do exist in schools.

The organizational system is the subject of this post.

Were you an observer, looking from the outside in, of a good/functional organizational system, you would notice that the system enables good people (faculty, staff, administrators, etc.) to do good--even outstanding--work, by nature of its design. Plenty of entrants into the system can survive within it quite well and for a long time, thank you very much. There may be a cultural misalignment for the occasional teacher or staff member within a good organizational system, but, truly, such misalignment occurs infrequently. However, culture does not equal system, and we need to keep that in mind.

Were you an observer of a bad/dysfunctional organizational system, however, you would see something quite different. Such a system can devour good entrants and spit them out, while the insiders in the dysfunctional system wonder why such entrants don't "live up to their promise". Entrants who would perform well in a good/functional system find it exceedingly difficult (and, after a brief time, impossible) to do good work within the dysfunctional system.

To be sure, good/functional systems can benefit from continued improvements and advancements, but remember that such systems are building on a successful foundation, and therefore will continue to be functional.

Dysfunctional systems, on the other hand, are notoriously difficult to improve. One may improve a piece or two within the system, but, in a highly dysfunctional system, other pieces will swell with more dysfunction to make up for the "improved" pieces. The dysfunctional system is its own beast. It is not by coincidence that, in dysfunctional systems, we see high/frequent turnover (unless an abusive-style fear prevents such turnover). This system's design results in a negative politics. The only way to improve the system, most will conclude, is to leave it entirely. And they're probably right.

Questions: How might we (school folks) further the research on systems by looking at our organizations and their systems? Where does education/training on systems take place currently, in terms of school leaders learning about systems? Is it worthwhile?

To Keep Things Whole: Be Like Steve?

     I'm typing this post on my ipad2, which I got the day after Steve Jobs died. I can't say I was inspired by his passing, as I already had placed the order. Similarly, Walter Isaacson's superb biography of Jobs came out soon after his death, on the previously set date.  I would have read the book anyway, because of both the subject and the author. Years before Jobs had requested that Isaacson write the book, and he had amazing access to Jobs and many other people. Jobs wanted the book to be honest, and it certainly seems to be, given the complexity in which it presents him.

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From Mark Crotty, HOS at St John's Episcopal in Dallas, TX. Thanks, Mark, for such a thoughtful post -- this is why I read your writing!

Words to Live By -- Guest Blogger Thomas Main

Almost ten years ago, in the early summer of 2002, I was sitting in my office, newly minted as Head of a PK-12 day school in Fairfield County, CT.  I knew the school well, having had a previous tenure there (1983-1990). I loved the community, and I was full of the passion and energy that it would take to impact the school in all sorts of ways.  I was looking forward to a meeting with a long time acquaintance later that morning; a man I had known professionally since I began my career as a teacher, 19 previous to this date.  He had just stepped down from a highly successful and long-term headship, and was working on a new educational venture.  He arrived, and after some introductory chat, I asked him for advice; what could he tell me that would really help as I began this voyage.  He looked at me and said: “I think that the most important thing for you to understand is that by any intelligent, reasonable standard, the job you are starting is completely impossible, and it is unreasonable to expect that you will be able to do it all well. No one can.”

 

Obviously, this took a little wind out of my sails, but we continued, and he elaborated.  He said I would be expected to be a skilled financial manager (I knew very little at the time), a savvy marketing and admission professional (I had never worked in admission), a strategic thinker that always had the big picture in mind and a detailed manager that would get to know the program at the grassroots level, a construction manager with a good sense for building design, and a leader that was both highly collaborative and extremely decisive.  I would need to be an active fund-raiser, but not seem driven by fund-raising.  I would be expected to be highly visible, which meant being at games, plays, Pre-K events, the Upper School Cum Laude induction, and Middle School sports awards (the list goes on forever), as well as extremely accessible, which meant being in my office for anyone (parent, student, teacher) who wanted to have a private conversation with me.  My expertise in faculty evaluation and hiring (which was largely untested), would need to yield immediate results.  My educational expertise would be expected to inspire and inform the work of faculty and students, and my gift for public speaking must engage crowds from every constituency ( I was pretty sure I didn’t have this gift).  I would quickly understand the deep history of the school and have a sixth sense for the needs and concerns of the alumni.  The Board would expect me to lead, but also meet all of their expectations.  And, without fail, I should know every student, all 685 of them, by name! My friend then said he could go on, but he was betting I had the idea.  I couldn’t do it!

 

No doubt, I was feeling a little deflated, chagrined, almost embarrassed by the youthful enthusiasm that had defined my first 2 weeks in office, but it was then that the real advice was offered: “So, Tom, if you want to be successful, the thing you have to do, above all else, is to determine your priorities.  What are you going to focus on, what is going to be most important to you.  You need to commit your time and your resources to that – in a relentless, and laser like manner.  You are not going to please everyone, and you are going to have to let some things go, and that will irritate some people, but you are going to succeed and you will accomplish what you set out to do.”  It was good advice then, and it is good advice now.  It’s one of those few pearls of wisdom that you live by – that you back your heels onto when you are immobilized by the sheer volume coming at you – and you need to re-center and decide what to do next.  I am better at it than I was way back then, but it is more also complicated - because I know more. This is a crazy job.  It’s so crazy sometimes that often I can’t describe it to anyone that isn’t a school head.  Problems are so complex that I can’t ask for advice, simply because it would take me two hours to adequately create the context for the issue that needs solving.  I stay grounded by knowing what to focus on, what my priorities are, and knowing those things that might not be a priority for a given year or few years.  The job is not impossible, at all, and my friend knew that. He did me a great favor that morning.  In fact, it is a great job, and all those things that seemed overwhelming a decade ago seem much more understandable today, and maybe a little less overwhelming. But in order for it to be a great job, I must stay focused on making it a job that it is possible to do.  And that is rooted in understanding my priorities and attending to them.

 

Tom Main is the Head of School at King Low Heywood Thomas in Stamford, CT. You can reach him at tmain@klht.org.